


Broken, Bruised, And Abandoned

by aliitvodeson



Category: The Song of the Lioness - Tamora Pierce, Tortall - Tamora Pierce
Genre: Gen, alternative universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-26
Updated: 2015-01-26
Packaged: 2018-03-09 02:50:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,193
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3233486
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aliitvodeson/pseuds/aliitvodeson
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alanna goes to the covenant, like she's supposed to. Thom finds that he rather likes palace life. He slides into the group of older pages, flashing smiles at Alex and sharing jokes with Gary. Coram even says that his riding has improved since they left Trebond, and that he's not a complete embarrassment any more. He takes advantage of the large palace library, and looks forward to Alanna's letter about the covenant life. Surely if he can find himself enjoying page training, then she would have found something nice in learning to be a lady.<br/>But the letter that comes is one none of them expect.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Broken, Bruised, And Abandoned

**Author's Note:**

> While there's plenty of Alanna going to the covenant AUs, and many more of how she becomes a warrior despite the Daughter's, I find myself slightly disappointed by the Thom centered ones. Especially those that turn him into the emotional black hole we see in Lioness. After all, he didn't start that way...

He says no, as she so feared he would. He will not disobey the Lord Trebond’s wishes, as she had begged him to do. The idea has merit, he tells her, as her eyes near tears. But he can’t. He’s not brave like her. For all he’s her brother, for all he longs to go to the Priests, he refused to go along with that he terms her most insane plan yet. She’s disappointed, and yells at him in words no high born lady should ever know, but he can see it in her eyes. She never really expected him to say yes either. She calls him coward when they part on the road, and he has the decency to bow his head in shame.  
It’s the last thing she says to him, before she goes to the covenant, and Thom rides with Coram to the palace.  
They have been there all of three weeks when Duke Gareth summons Thom out of his mathematics class. He shrugs his shoulders at Alex’s silent question, and follows the steward to the Lord’s office. Already waiting there is Coram, his fingers cleaning the already spotless knife on his lap. He doesn’t meet Thom’s eyes. The Duke waves for Thom to take a seat, and he sees the seal on the paper. Somehow, he already knows.  
She’ll be alright, he thinks, when the Duke finishes reading the letter. She’s ten, she can take care of herself, and- Oh Gods, she’s only ten! His sister, his twin, his Alanna, Mithros forgive him, Goddess have pity on him, Black God have mercy, he should have said yes. She’s ten and she’s out there alone and he should have told her yes.  
He makes some clumsy excuse to the Duke, and runs out of the office. He runs all the way out of the palace, past the other pages coming from their lessons, and the guards who try to catch him. He runs until his legs give way beneath him, and he realizes he’s all the way in the Lower City, out of breath and with his new hose torn.  
“Easy there, lad,” someone says to him, and gives him a hand up onto a bench. The man Thom finds himself clutching onto isn’t all that much older than him, with twinkling green eyes and a mouth that’s somehow managed to twist its way into a caring smirk. “You run all the way from the palace?”  
“How?” Oh, right the uniform. Probably pretty distinctive; he really doesn’t know that much about clothing in the capital but the pages’ wear is unusually bright.  
“Thom, isn’t it? That new lad, rode in not three weeks past. Ain’t too many fresh pages this year, and you’ve got them eyes folks whispering about.”  
Thom realizes with a start that not only is the man still talking, he’s talking to Thom. “Yes. Thom of Trebond.”  
The man grins. “And what brings Thom of Trebond all the way to the Lower City?”  
“My sister,” he begins, but the rest of the sentence cuts away inside Thom’s throat, leaving those two words as his only explanation. The man quirks a solitary eyebrow, asking for the rest of it without saying a word. Thom takes a deep breath, and tries once more. “My sister… She ran away from the covenant.”  
“And you think she’s going to be down here?”  
“No.” The man laughs, despite Thom’s harsh tone. “It’s my fault she’s gone. Which makes it my fault if she dies.”  
“And how can it possibly be your fault, since you’re here and she’s all the way at the covenant? Or not, supposing she ain’t been found yet.  
Thom gulps, the guilt washing over him once more. “Because I wouldn’t let her come here.”  
Now the man looks truly interested. “You wouldn’t? Forgive me boldness, lad, but unless you nobles changed thing a lot since I last checked, tis your lord father who makes that choice.”  
“We were going to trade places,” Thom says softly, knowing this part of the story can never make its way back to Duke Gareth’s ears. “I would go to the covenant, and then to the Priests. And she… She could become a knight.”  
The man is quiet after that for a bit, and Thom gets the impression he’s deep in thought, even if his eyes haven’t lost their cheerful glimmer, nor his mouth the smile. Finally, when Thom starts thinking about how he’s going to explain his run from the palace to the Duke, the man shrugs. “Well, nothing you or I can do ‘bout this from here, lad. Come on, I’ll walk ya back safely to the palace.” They do, in near silence, and Thom can practically feel the thoughts coming out of the man’s mind. They part halfway up the temple district, where the palace gates can be seen at the top of the hill. “I’ll leave ya here, lad. Tis safe enough now.”  
“Wait,” Thom calls to the man’s back. “What’s your name?” He wants to find this stranger again, if only to thank him for listening without laughing or calling Thom a young fool.  
“George,” he says without turning around. “You’ll be hearing from me soon enough.” And then he’s gone, swallowed up by the crowd.  
The next two months past slowly. The scandal of Alanna’s vanishing act sweeps through the court, whispers following Thom around until the Gary puts a stop to the talk when he pushes Ralon under the pond after a particularly nasty comment about young girls and upper rooms in inns. Thom tells him that he doesn’t need others to fight his battles, and Gary makes some wish wash pass about needing to wash the oil out of Ralon’s hair. Thom quirks a small grin, and after that it gets much easier to ignore the old noble ladies who stare at him when he passes, as if he too might run off to the wild unknown.  
As court scandals go, it’s over fairly quickly, Jonathan tells Thom one afternoon. Alanna had never even been to court, and Thom’s too far out of public eye to really matter. Thom still can’t help but think that if this is a small scandal, he never wants to be part of a big one.  
Thom is washing down his pony after a bout of riding lessons when Stefan, the head hostler sticks his head into the stall. Thom pauses. Normally the hostlers only talk to the pages when they’ve mistreated their horses. “I’ve a letter for ye, master Thom.”  
Eyebrows drawn tight together, Thom takes the paper. When he turns to ask Stefan who sent it, and why it hasn’t come through Duke Gareth like the rest of the pages’ mail, the hostler is gone.  
There’s no seal on the envelope, and he can’t feel any nasty spells on it. Thom still opens the paper cautiously, fingers prepared to drop it at the first sign of nasty magic. The contents of the letter as short as Stefan’s visit.

> There’s rumours of a Tortallan girl matching your sister’s looks making her way through Galla – G 

Thom nearly weeps for joy. 


End file.
